Tuesday, April 11, 2017

mama said knock you out (??!)

hey guys! it's l.l. cool j. tribute week at shopping our stash! ok, sorry, just kidding, lol! :) "mama said knock you out" really and truly *IS* the name of this week's challenge, though; but all we really want is for you to dust off some of your older punches and dies and use them on a project! easy, right?

i knew immediately i wanted to use the funky diecut chipboard letters i sell in my etsy shop, and that i would probably also get out at least one of the three or four birthday word dies i own but do not use often enough. i also wanted to use them on SCRAPS of paper to make it even more "stash-centric". but the real bonus was, just before i started working on this, i found a baggie FULL of assorted shapes that had been punched at various times, for different projects, and somehow never got used:

this seemed like an AWESOME time to thin out that particular herd, so i made two background panels.

card one used up most of the one inch hexagons. btw, here's the best "tip" anyone can give you for precise alignment of geometric shapes: if you use a background paper with a grid you don't have to measure!!! this particular patterned paper happens to be a literal grid of squares, but any small to medium print that's arranged evenly in lines will work.

my other card used up some (but not all) of the circles, in a much looser pattern:

this one was inspired by a sketchbook page i had-- quite coincidentally-- done earlier in the week, as part of an instagram inspiration challenge hosted by rae missigman, for which i combined the prompts "round" and "stacked". for this page, i used circles with more prominent flower patterns and funked it up a bit by outlining the flowers with a fine tipped pen. you can see that in the card version i omitted that step, so that the sentiment could be the focus of the design. (i'd bet you money that you WILL be seeing this idea again at some point, though!!!)

need a little more inspiration involving the clever use of punches and dies? my SOS dt darlings have lots and lots of it... go and see! ♥

12 comments:

Oh my goodness how incredibly cool are all three of these projects! Your journal page is printworthy! And the cards just rock my paper loving heart! Great tip on the grid paper and I adore the stacked circles and texty layers. What a stashbuster this turned out to be! Hugs, Autumn

Woot woot woot I am allllllll over an LL Cool J tribute challenge LOLMomma said KNOCK YOU OUT!And that's just what your projects always do lady! They totally knock me out!!!The things you do with bits and bobs...simply amazing! You turn scraps into beautiful works of artsy awesomeness!

Subscribe Now: Feed Icon

Follow by Email

hi there!

♥ welcome! ♥

my name is lauren, and i'm a paperholic...i have more art supplies than any sensible person needs (but i'm NOT giving 'em back!)...i've been married to my lovely husband, jeff, for 20+ years...we have no kids or pets (no room, what with all the paper!)...my back has a mind of its own...i'm addicted to chapstick...i can be bribed with ice cream or a hot stone pedicure...the museum hasn't been built that i would not enjoy...my favorite form of punctuation is the ellipsis...i like making stuff...wanna be friends?